The Economist (May 12)
SoftBank’s founder Masayoshi Son is now a contender for “the most influential person in technology.” His $100 billion Vision Fund is “gobbling up stakes in the world’s most exciting young companies…. disrupting both the industries in which it invests and other suppliers of capital…. Even if the fund ends up flopping, it will have several lasting effects on technology investing.”
Tags: Capital, Disrupting, Influential, Investing, Lasting effects, Masayoshi Son, SoftBank, Technology, Vision Fund
New York Times (May 29)
SoftBank’s takeover of the mobile phone provider Sprint could benefit U.S. consumers. SoftBank “was largely responsible for making high-speed Internet affordable to consumers in the early 2000s by offering faster service and at prices that were less than half of N.T.T.’s rates. A few years later, it used a similar low-price strategy in the wireless business. If it competes aggressively in the United States, SoftBank could help shake up the highly concentrated American industry.”
Tags: Consumers, Internet, N.T.T., Phones, Prices, Service, SoftBank, Sprint, Takeover, U.S., Wireless
